


across time

by IHadHimOnTheRopes (CarterReid)



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Avengers Tower, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, F/M, Hydra (Marvel), Identity Issues, Identity Porn, Identity Reveal, M/M, Past Relationship(s), Post-Avengers (2012), Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Secret Identity, Secrets
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-11
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2019-11-15 14:35:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18075242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarterReid/pseuds/IHadHimOnTheRopes
Summary: Bucky Barnes hasn't always been Bucky Barnes. Before he fought his way out of the ice, he was the Soldier.Now he's not sure what he is, but he knows it's his duty to keep Stevie safe... even if Stevie doesn't know its him underneath the mask.





	1. a moment in before

He remembered pain and cold and black; creeping ice in his veins, burning him from the inside and making his body groan in agony. He remembered harsh words and a fist glancing off his jaw; demands of him to  _hurt,_ to  _kill_ , to  _obey_. 

He remembered nothing else. 

Until he did. 

Until a single voice ringing out against cold stone and black steel that chased away the warmth, had him  _gasping_ for the surface. 

" _Bucky_."

It was like waking from a daze. Slowly he became aware of just where he was, just what he was doing. His hand, cradling a handgun, finger looped around the trigger and itching to  _do something_. His body, aching and burning in too many places to name, felt stiff and rigid - a wooden puppet just taken out of his box. A man: begging, crying, snot tracing his features and piss staining his trousers, was on his knees before him, eyes wild and desperate, pleading to live. Instead of nothing, a spark of  _wrong_ flared deep in his chest. 

There were others too. Men, dressed in military uniforms, hats tucked under their arms, watching him as though he were a particularly interesting exotic animal. They spoke too, in quick-fire Russian about tests and  _obedience._

" _\- acceptable of course. The Asset has complied with all instruction. Not even the Captain's voice can undo the conditioning."_

" _It's hesitating."_

The man laughed, hard and harsh.  _"It hasn't been given an order yet."_

There was a pressing migraine beginning to push at the inside of his skull and his eyes flickered shut for a few seconds, ignoring the gritty pain that accompanied the action. He felt cold and dirty, as though he hadn't slept or washed in weeks. 

Perhaps he hadn't. He didn't remember  _before._

" _Play it again_ ," someone ordered. Then:

" _Bucky_ ," a voice laughed over the loudspeakers, humour bleeding into the air. There was a harsh thud in his chest, followed by a tight, squeezing feeling, and then nothing. Instead he was swamped in dappled sunlight, his cheek pressed into golden hair and laughing so hard his stomach hurt. The urge to  _protect_ was burning inside him, leaving him breathless and desperate. An empty apartment, a clattering windowpane and cold, cold nights spent huddling under a threadbare blanket, legs entwined with another and listening to the rasping rattle of a man's chest, tears in his eyes and praying to anyone that would listen.  _Please, God, anything,_ it was his voice he knew.  _Anything, take me; take my life, my sanity, please, just save Stevie_ - 

Stevie. 

" _Soldier_ ," a commander barked, breaking the cycle of images shredding his mind. He glanced up, sluggish and unsure. " _Kill the traitor,_ " he ordered, jerking his head to the man now wailing on the floor. 

This was a test. 

A test of - 

" _Bucky_ ," Steve said. 

That was Steve. 

Steve's voice. 

Blonde, thin frame, bright blue eyes and all the force of a spitfire. His Steve. 

Steve wouldn't want this. 

" _Solder_!" The Commander's face was red and blustering and he strode forward with a purpose that made him want to cringe back. He saw the hand come arching down towards him - a slap, a fist, he wasn't sure. 

He caught the hand. 

There was a long, heavy, dangerous silence.  

" _Bucky_ ," Steve said, followed closely by a laugh. 

" **Steve** ," he replied, rasping and too quiet.

The Commander gasped and it was then, as the blood drained from the man's face, that he shot him between the eyes. 


	2. blue

The news had been cycling the same information for hours:  _Alien Invasion in New York_. It was in bold, garish font scrolling across the screen, desperately trying to convince the world that they were serious, it wasn't a hoax, and the people of Earth were not alone in the Universe. There was life out there. Life that wasn't quite as kind as the ugly thing that sat in wicker bicycle baskets, made children laugh and brought flowers back to life... Bucky  _still_ didn't understand that film.

But even with the force of another world behind them, the invaders had been thwarted. Not by a military or politics, but by a rag-tag team of extraordinary people that the world still wasn't quite sure how to take. Bucky had sat in the last of Hydra's Hungarian safehouses, the corpses of the men he'd shot lying haphazardly around him and the information dockets rammed in the back of the safe strewn on the table in front, eyes glued to the screen as images flickered before him. People were scrambling through the carnage, bloodied and bruised, some screaming but almost all were crying. There was a giant, green creature that jumped in and out of frame, bouncing off buildings and through them too, throwing cars like they were softballs. Bucky couldn't help but shiver at the sight of such a beast and if he hadn't known just what Hydra scientist's were capable of, he'd have thought the image impossible. A man with metal skin painted red and gold, firing light from his hands featured regularly, and it took a moment before the image was given a caption:  _Tony Stark's Iron Man_. Something heavy settled in his chest at the name Stark. He filed the thought away, eyes tracking another flying man, although he didn't wear armour like Stark. Instead he wore a bright red cape flapping out behind him, waving what looked like a hammer around his head. Bucky scoffed, until of course he saw the man conjured up lightening like it was nothing. Then something close to respect bloomed in his chest. A red headed women, twisting and weaving her way through enemies (the footage impressive even though the hand of the citizen who took it was shaking violently) and a man with a bow and arrow and a determined expression, were fighting too - both holding their own in a fight where people controlled the weather and a giant thundered down the streets. Bucky thought  _they_ deserved most of the respect. But there was one image that awoke a combination of emotions inside him that had left Bucky reeling. 

He didn't know the man's face, it was obscured by a mask. He sure as hell didn't recognised the uniform, although something akin to fury raged within him at the thought of someone  _wearing_ it. Because he knew the original occupant was gone. Even the shield, stoking equal parts agony, rage and longing, did not produce anything more than a tightness in his chest. Then the screen changed and all Bucky could see were blue eyes. His breath hitched and he knew, had he not been sitting, his legs would have buckled beneath him. Spitfire. That was his spitfire, his  _Steve._

_Oh God, what's he doing?! Please no, Stevie, **please -**_

His mind skipped, only forming the same words over and over. That was him, it had to be. Steve - the one who gave him a name, who woke him up and set him free - dirty and bloody, head bowed as he spoke with his team. He seemed sombre and weary but also so _old._ Blue, blue eyes looking sharply back in the direction of the camera, fire bleeding through his irises. Bucky didn't understand,  _couldn't_. Because Steve was small. Because Steve was gone. Perhaps his mind had begun to invent things to fill the blank that lingered there? Seeing phantoms in the gaze of strangers. 

So he let out a long, steadying breath, turned off the television, looked back at the papers and picked his next target. 

He ignored televisions for a while after that. 

He made his way through Europe with the finesse and force of a wrecking ball. He'd never wanted to become a killer - the tightness in his chest and the shake in his human hand told him that - but that was what Hydra had made him into. From Hungary, he went north, blazing through Slovakia and up into Poland. He slipped on and off trains, in and out of crowds, blending in with the chaotic _humanness_ around him but never stopping long enough to let himself believe he too was human. He rarely spoke, but often words forced their way past his lips at night: screams and pleas. Bucky found that Steve's name woke him regularly. After worried knocking on the door woke him for the third time in as many days, yet another stranger's concern at hearing " _P_ _lease, I'll give anything, just let him live...just let him live_ " screamed through the walls, Bucky slept rough for a while. At least then his pleas were swallowed by the darkness lingering in abandoned buildings.

It was long, gruelling work; slowly dismantling an organisation that had, for the past seventy years, been infecting the world like a parasite and fuelling catastrophe - but Bucky found pleasure in it. He enjoyed slitting the throats of the men that forced him into the chair; who laughed when he was wiped over and over and over again; who unmade him until he had nothing left other than a half realised image of a skinny, blonde-haired man whose breath rattled in his chest, whose knuckles were bloody and whose voice made his feel warm inside whenever he said " _Bucky_ ". He'd tried to pick up information on just  _who_ he was as he went from facility to facility, but piecing together a puzzle without the corners or any idea of what the pictures was frustrating and difficult. Not to mention there seemed to be no record of him, or anything similar to 'The Winter Soldier', anywhere. Yet still he continued and by the time he'd reached Poznan, Hydra had discovered just who had spent the past few months burning their operation to the ground and began to send other assets after him. 

Many came. 

All failed. 

He ended up in Germany for six weeks, breaking into secure facilities and laughing as heart-rates rocketed at the sight of him, before back-tracking after a lead took him to Sokovia. He laid siege to a castle, set the old stone on fire and watched as the alien technology Hydra had hoarded for themselves after the invasion turned to dust before his eyes. Watching Strucker choke on his own blood had been so incredibly satisfying, especially as the man had died knowing that it was  _Bucky_ who had brought his world down around him. The glowing stick they were all so incredibly obsessed with was too cumbersome to take with him, so he broke it down, hid the staff and kept the stone tucked away in his pack, away from prying eyes and  _out_ of Hydra's reach. A price for his capture was posted on black sites the next day and Hydra had apparently offered $10 million for The Winter Soldier to be delivered to them alive along with everything he owned. 

It made travelling only slightly more difficult.

From Sokovia, he journeyed the length of Austria in five days, hitching from border to border, before kicking down the doors of a few Nazis in Switzerland who had hoped the country's neutrality might save them. Bucky quickly, and decisively, rid them of that nativity. It was possibly more satisfying that crushing Hydra. Three mercenaries came after him, three mercenaries left with holes in their skulls. 

It was then that S.H.I.E.L.D made their first attempt to bring him in.

It started as a couple of rookies, desk jockeys off to see if the rumours of a man with a metal arm and a black mask setting fire to the world were true. STRIKE teams quickly followed. Bucky avoided as many conflicts as he could but he couldn't run from them all. Leaving unconscious S.H.I.E.L.D agents tied up outside of embassy's gave him some amusement though.   

He kept moving. Crossing the border in France was easy and Bucky lost track for a couple of weeks. He'd entered in the back of a truck with fifteen other people, mainly families, fleeing their own war, and the cramped cold of it all tore into his mind and left him shaking. He didn't remember razing the buildings to the ground, but when he finally slipped back into himself, his hands were slick with blood and ash and there were worries on the streets about the 'arson' and 'devastation' of several nights and whether it was terrorism. It was then, huddled in the corner of a cheap hostel, body shivering as he tried to pick the congealed blood from in between the plates of his arm that he finally risked looking for the group he'd seen some four months previously.   

In the end it was barely a minute. One google search and the engine gave him everything. 

 _The Avengers_. 

His name was Steve. 

The man with the blue eyes: Steve Rogers. Captain America. He was, he was -

Bucky didn't realise he was hyperventilating until he blacked out. 

There was so little about himself he remembered. Even his name, it was  _given._ It felt right when  _he'd_ said it and so Bucky clung to that. He'd clung to the name and to the half-formed flashes of a breathtakingly beautiful soul wrapped in fragile bone, idiocy, moral superiority and bright, blue eyes. He was everything to Bucky because he was all Bucky had. To see the name with the face, confirmed, along with links and links like: _The Return of Captain America!_ and  _The Story of America's Greatest Hero_ and  _From Howling Commandos to The Avengers: How Captain America is Still Fighting for Us._ He read them all, of course he did, and when he read about a memorial opening up in D.C. in Steve's honour, his heart clamoured to go. It was then he found himself. 

It was his face, he knew. Dressed in military garb, hat slightly crooked on his head, tags around his neck and a dashing smile in place, there he was. Underneath it read: _"Srgt. James Buchanan 'Bucky' Barnes, just days before his deployment to the front lines"_. 

Bucky _Barnes_. 

He kept reading. About his life, when he was born, his military history, his family, his work as a 'Commando' and finally, his history with Steve. 

He remembered nothing.

So he quietly closed the tab, swallowed heavily and willed himself to calm down. There were still Hydra bases in Europe - roots that, should he leave unchecked would flourish into evil - so he pushed down the desperate yawning hole in his chest and got to work. 

Safe houses, labs, equipment, artefacts, anything they had that was remotely important to them, Bucky destroyed. But even with the determination, will and focus he had, Bucky knew he'd missed people, files, other assets, in his time as a one-man army. The only silver-lining was that he knew where they were going. In their haste to save what they could when realising that killing him wasn't going to be effective, Hydra had, inadvertently, showed their hand. Moving anything precious overseas to America, Hydra began to consolidate everything in one, highly defensible position, no doubt driven to panic by his crusade. A few half clues strung together and names that he didn't know but would later turn out to be politicians and statesmen, told him that the world was on the edge of something, and Hydra wanted to push them over. 

And so sixteen months after he woke up and thirteen months after the world looked to the sky and saw more than stars, Bucky packed his bags and headed home.


	3. monument

Avenger's Tower was clean, sharp lines, clear glass and glittering steel, looming into the clouds with a majesty that vastly understated the extent of the damage done a year previously. It looked both at home on the New York skyline and yet considerably more noble. The giant, gleaming A hanging in place of where STARK used to once sit, was an illuminated beacon to the world that despite everything, they had heroes watching over them. It was quite special: a monument to gods amongst men.  

Bucky hated it the moment he saw it. 

It wasn't what it stood for, nor where it was, but it was the  _windows._  For most it was modern, spacious even, but all the soldier could think about was how many angles a sniper would have. How many places an enemy could watch you from. Even with Stark's tech laced into the fabric of the building, Bucky easily avoided the cameras that tracked the street below; he noted that while most of the external windows  _were_ bulletproof, there was a considerable number that weren't or held easily exploitable weaknesses. He noted the security measures: both bio-metric and other, and immediately knew how he'd outwit them. His hope that Steve was  _safe_ with these people dwindled the longer he observed the building. His intention to take note, satisfy his curiosity and the insistent tattoo in his chest, and then continue with his crusade faded at the knowledge that the most important person in his universe was woefully unprotected should someone like him decide that the man was better with a hole in his head. 

Especially given the frequent (and predictable) trips to Washington D.C.. 

It only took Bucky two weeks of watching Steve to know just how he took his coffee; his favourite route in the park; the book store he favoured above all others; and, of course, that every Sunday morning, at precisely 6:00am, he'd leave the tower and walk to Penn Station to catch the 6:45am train into Union. The pattern was dangerous, especially because he always met the same people there too. A late breakfast with Peggy Carter at the retirement home where she lived, followed by a run and then lunch with former Para-rescue turned VA counsellor Sam Wilson. If he was feeling nostalgic, he might visit the Smithsonian Institute, lingering at the memorials to the Commandos and the footage of Peggy from later years. Then he'd walk back to the station and return to New York, slipping back into routine as he did. 

It was maddening. 

Bucky wanted to shake the man, tell him to be careful because  _what the **fuck** was he thinking_ _going off and making himself vulnerable -_ but he didn't. In truth, he couldn't. Not least because the very  _sight_ of Steve made him freeze in his tracks. He only wondered what hearing the man's voice in real life might do - probably see him pass out where he stood. In truth, part of him wanted to run. Every trainer and handler he'd had told him over and over to cut out any weaknesses, and Bucky knew Steve was a weakness for him. So the soldier clamoured at the hastily erected wall Bucky had put up between the two of them in his mind, it nearly inconsolable with the need to flee. But the fierceness in Bucky's chest that made him sick at the thought of running away was strong enough to resist. Because every fibre of his being told him he had to  _protect_ Steve. That the man he could barely remember wasn't just important, he was  ** _everything_**. 

And so Bucky stayed, watching from afar and taking time to plan.

It had been four weeks since he arrived in America, three weeks, six days and an hour, since he first saw the gold haired man who was so incredibly  _right_ but also so incredibly  _wrong,_ that he took the opportunity. 

The gaping holes in Stark's security were yawning chasms, whispering that he exploit them, and so he did, gliding through gaps in camera rotations, taking advantage of human errors and, of course, Stark's worrying vulnerable systems. When he finally reached what appeared to be the accommodation floors, he lingered, suddenly filled with nerves he couldn't explain. While his face was covered by his mask, and his eyes by his goggles, he still felt desperately vulnerable. The place was too white, too bright, too  _open_. Even the knives pressed into the small of his back, and the others strapped to his thighs and arms, were little comfort. There was a reason he preferred to work in the dark. He slipped out of the air-shaft in the ceiling and onto the floor with barely a sound. A glance told him he was on a balcony of sorts, with a laboratory behind him and a communal area below. Both were empty so he vaulted the railing, ignoring the staircase to one side, and landed on the worktop of the bar. He dropped into a crouch, taking a moment to check before stepping forward, hand lingering at his side where two throwing knives were hidden. His eyes flitted from place to place until they rested in the far corner. 

There, underneath the staircase and tucked just out of sight, was the  _shield._

His breathing, previously slow, became immediately shallow and he was pulled forward as though in a trance, all thought to stealth gone as the fingers on his flesh hand began reaching out towards it. The metal was cool beneath his skin, but smooth. The paint looked fresh and Bucky couldn't help put smile beneath the mask at the red-white-blue, but something tugged uncomfortably in his stomach at the sight of the star. His own blood red one an almost mockery. Something inside him _hurt_ at that. His metal hand joined his flesh one and together their hiked the shield up, slipping his arm through the straps. His breath left him all at once and a flicker of memory began to burn through his mind.

He remembered thick, black mud beneath his boots and the smell of wet, sodden ground, and smoke. Men, all in uniform, huddled around them, speaking in different languages and accents, determined and sometimes sombre, just more often smiling. The words "Cap" and "Sarge" were echoing around him, with laughter and eye-rolling and a deep, unyielding respect that Bucky didn't quite understand. And Steve, golden haired and blue eyed Steve, was there, the same Spitfire but bigger, broader, taller - like the man Bucky had seen on the television but in a different uniform, with a different look in his gaze. He looked younger, less hollowed out, as though he might still see the beauty and promise in the world despite being calf deep in mud and shit.

The images flickered behind his eyes; he never really saw much, only fragments. His mind was a film that had been cut at random points and spliced together with no thought or consideration to who might watch it and, not for the first time, a deep feeling of frustration and resentment rose inside him. It tightened his stomach and squeezed at his heart, because Bucky could feel that these memories were important, that the men lingering around him were more than strangers on the battlefield. He knew they didn't deserve to be forgotten...but he couldn't remember _why_.  

The sound of bare feet on the floor behind him startled him and he quickly slipped into the shadows, carefully placing the shield back where it had been sitting. 

A red-haired woman in jean short-shorts came wandering out into the area, head buried in a pack of papers of some kind. She hadn't noticed him and Bucky knew he could easily stay hidden or run, but there was no threat posed by the woman and Bucky needed these people to  _help_ him. The woman eventually glanced up and stopped dead in her tracks, breath whistling between her teeth, eyes flicking between his arm and his masked face. 

"Hello," Bucky rasped, a slight Russian accent bleeding through to obscure the Brooklyn that had been steadily returning. It had been months since he'd spoken to another human being, preferring to sign when in public, but something told him the woman might appreciate it more. The woman's mouth opened, then closed, then opened again, eyes now dropping from his arm to the guns at his side, so Bucky continued. "Stark _?_ " he asked.

"What?"

Bucky pointed to his chest. "Winter," he announced, because there wasn't a chance in hell he was playing all his cards, especially when he barely knew  _who_ or  _what_ he really was. Besides, if Stark was any kind of smart, he wouldn't need to know the name 'Bucky' when the one 'Winter' was just as famous. After his exploits in Europe, Bucky was sure almost everyone knew. S.H.I.E.L.D did after all and Stark liked to outsmart S.H.I.E.L.D from what he'd heard. 

Again, the woman appeared startled. "Pepper," she blurted then blinked, as though unsure whether she'd actually said her name. She drew a breath before bellowing: "TONY! TONY, GET DOWN HERE  _RIGHT **NOW**_!". There was a clashing sound from somewhere nearby, followed by clanging, the sound of footsteps and then two sheepish looking men were running into view, thundering around a corner and skidding to a halt.

"Pep, we -" the first began before he stopped speaking, eyes pinning themselves to Bucky. " _Ugh_ , J?"

" _My apologies sir, I am unsure just how he avoided my security systems,"_ a voice announced from the ceiling making Bucky flinch and look up, the hairs on the back of his neck rising sharply. A whirring had him looking back and Stark's armour was flying through the air and encasing him in an instant. 

"Alright Terminator," he began, "one more step and I drop you."

Pepper hesitated from her place now behind Stark. "Tony," she began quietly, "I don't think he want's to hurt us."

"Pep, I -"

"You are Stark?" Bucky asked, voice beginning to hurt just a little now. There was a long pause and then Iron Man's face place slid up, exposing the bemused but cautious expression of the billionaire. 

"That's me," he replied slowly, eyes narrowing. "Any particularly reason you've broken into my house?" 

Bucky took a second. "You have shit security," he said before reaching into his pocket and pulling a memory stick free. He noticed that Stark's hands had come up in defence but relaxed again. "I need assistance," he continued, tossing the stick towards Stark. Interestingly it was the other man who caught it, blinking up at him nervously.

"What is this?" he asked, pushing up the glasses sliding down his nose.

"Mission," Bucky responded. 

"Right, okay," Stark said, disbelief and something else bleeding into his tone. "Alright J, run a complete diagnostic on him and pull any files about Cyborg here please."

" _Certainly sir_ ," came the voice. This time Bucky couldn't help the snarl that escaped him as he ducked, rolled and pulled a gun, protecting himself from the unknown attacker. Iron Man fully engaged again but Bucky paid him no attention, eyes tilted skywards to catch a glimpse of the man. After a minute of silence, there was a hiss of metal, a click and then:

"What are you doing?" Stark, without the armour, was stood only a metre from him.

Bucky glared at him from behind the goggles, wondering just how he was going to explain when Pepper jumped in. "Jarvis isn't real, Winter," she said, drawing all attention to her. "He's A.I."

"A.I.?" 

"You don't know A.I.?" Stark asked. 

"I do not know what is not mission related," Bucky responded and, with a reassuring nod from the woman, stood stiffly and re-holstered his gun. Another pause followed before:

" _Sir, I have found files pertaining to our guest,_ " Jarvis announced, making Bucky tense. " _Code Name: The Winter Soldier,"_ he began. " _It appears S.H.I.E.L.D has been attempting to bring him in for quite some time."_

"Bring him in?" the other man asked. "What -"

"Read," Bucky said, pointing at the memory stick. "Read it all."

"Okay Snowflake," Stark said, "follow me."

They left Pepper in the communal area and the woman was immediately on the phone, speaking in rushed, but quiet, tones. The other man who was nervously worrying the memory-stick was quickly introduced to Bucky as "Banner" by Stark, and the armour that Stark was wearing followed behind them like a bodyguard. Bucky wondered if it would be as easy as it looked to take down the suit. 

Eventually they entered a lab of some kind. Papers, engine parts and other pieces of twisted metal lay strewn about haphazardly and the man nearly tripped over a set of wires on his way in. There was a whiteboard in the far corner, with algorithms, notes and, interestingly, a game of hangman where someone had labelled the man 'Loki' and another had drawn an arrow going through his eye in bright blue pen. Bucky didn't get either reference. 

Stark stopped in the centre of the room before snatching the stick of Banner and plugging it in. A few seconds later and he was flinging his arms out wide, sending the virtual documents Bucky had collected to hover around them. It was very easy to see the extent of Hydra's infection, and of course just how nefarious their intention for America was, within moments, and after a few minutes it began to compute.

"Oh my God," Banner breathed, looking around. 

"What is this?" Stark said, standing suddenly, voice aggressive. 

"Hydra," Bucky answered. "Or at least what is left."

"Left? Hydra's gone," Stark continued. 

"Not yet."

There was a paused where the billionaire turned back to the documents, sifting through them before taking in a sharp breath. "This is France and Sokovia and - _shit_ ," he cursed, "it's  **you**. Winter Soldier, I  _knew_ I recognised that. It's you,  _you've_ been doing this? The explosions and the deaths in Europe? The attacks?" Stark continued, walking into Bucky's space. "Well I hate to break it to you pal, but I'm not in the arms game anymore, so if you want weapons, you've broken into the wrong house." 

"I only kill Hydra," he repeated, standing his ground. 

" _Tony_ ," Banner breathed, sensing a confrontation, "if they were all Hydra..."

"Then we have a serious problem," Stark muttered, stepping back, eyes glancing to the list of names he had gathered. 

"We have to check this out," Banner added and Bucky heard the unspoken words there: _just in case this is real._

"I know," Stark sighed before narrowing his gaze. "But, there are some serious honchos on here. They aren't the sort to just open up and play nice, even if America's new favourite superheroes start asking. Not to mention most of these people don't like me." He lapsed into silence before swinging around and stabbing a finger at Bucky. "How's about you tell us why we should trust you, Tin Man?"

Bucky only shrugged. "Trust me or don't. I only need your help."

There was a heavy silence where Stark and Banner traded glances, seemingly having an entire conversation before the billionaire dragged a hand down his face. "Well we might as well have a look. If this is true then they're planning something  _big,_ " he chucked suddenly, seemingly startled at himself for the reaction before: "it looks like ol' Capsicle didn't get all of 'em in the end, did he? Maybe he's not America's Greatest Avenger eh?"

The rage that surged within him at Stark's sentence was incandescent. Bucky couldn't explain it, nor why his body trembled and his tongue felt bloody and heavy in his mouth. The plates on his arm whirred as he shifted and it was the noise perhaps that drew the men's gazes, and concentration, back to him. Stark's focused immediately on his arm. 

"Where'd ya get that anyway?" he asked. "That's a fancy prosthetic."

"Hydra," Bucky growled, trying to push down the rage until he felt something like calm. At the suspicious looks from the men, he stepped forward, searching through the projected files until all information concerning him appeared. There was nothing there he didn't already remember. There were no names, no defining features, no pictures of him without the mask. It was only training procedures, cryogenic protocols and his successful missions in the sixties, seventies and eighties. He pulled it forward and let them read.

He let them read about the hours of torture where they beat him, cut him, pulled out his nails; how they broke his bones systematically, methodically, just so they could measure how quickly he regenerated and record his responses to pain. He let them see the chair, and how he was pushed in again and again, wiped until nothing was left. Until words in his file read:  _Asset shows no trace of humanity or past identity; re-conditioning is complete._  He let them see the training, the starvation, the psychological driving, the isolation and, finally, the tube. Where he was strapped down and frozen over and over until he could awake and be the weapon they had forged him into. 

Banner removed himself after a few moments with a weighted look at Tony and a muttered sentence about his heart-rate. Bucky heard him vomit in the next room. Stark, however, read it all.

Every. Word.

At the end of the file, after enduring fifty six minutes of gore and horror, he took in a steadying breath, nodded once to himself, and turned to face him. Bucky could see the shake in his hands, the grit of his teeth and the hard lines of his shoulder. "They did that to you?"

Bucky shrugged. "How else would I become mission ready?"

Another long, steadying breath. "Even if the team won't help, I will," he promised, "with this and with Hydra and with getting your head back on straight. I'm not the best in dealing with shit, but if you let it, this'll kill you." He nodded, almost to himself. "You got a name?"

"Winter," he offered. 

Stark looked unhappy. "That's the name they gave you," he said. 

Bucky couldn't help but smile sadly beneath the mask. "It's the only name I've earned right now," he replied.

Something sad crossed the inventor's features before: "Alright buddy," he began, "lets burn these bastards to the ground, eh?"


	4. realisation

Stark didn't introduce him to the Avengers immediately. Instead he ushered him to another floor with all the commodities Bucky could need and more, with a muttered remark at how their "resident old timer wouldn't appreciate ex-Hydra in the building" and "it's gonna be a few hours so just, I dunno, don't ninja anyone...and wash, because you smell" and, after a very terse rebuke from Bucky, "yeah, yeah, I'll fix the damn security system, Tin-Man, jeeze, not that anyone other than you's managed to bypass it." With that he disappeared, leaving Bucky in what was possibly the most luxurious and over-the-top place he'd ever been in in his life.

The floor was, according to the man in the ceiling, all his - but Bucky knew immediately he wouldn't be using the open-plan living room / dining room /kitchen often given the entire of the room backed onto a wall of windows. The kitchen, just off to one side, was clean and opulent too and while the fridge was empty, the freezer and cupboards were all bursting with food. There was a hallway that led towards three separate bedrooms: one master with adjoining bathroom and only one window to worry about, and two others in a rather garish colour. There was a main bathroom complete with a walk in shower, large tub, vanity station and a sauna which joined it Jack-and-Jill style. The other rooms were a study, a snug and what looked like a poorly furnished gym. The only thing there were two yoga mats, a large ball and four sad looking plants, leaves drooping over their pots and stems slightly yellow. 

He watered them first before moving them into the light. 

After that he checked for recording devices and cameras, of which he found none, and then he dragged black-out curtains from the closet and spent twenty five minutes hanging them in front of every window in the living room, one at the end of the hall and another in the master bedroom he had decided to claim for himself. With that finished, he checked the wardrobe for a towel and walked into the bathroom.

If Bucky was honest with himself, he couldn't remember exactly when he'd last washed. It was definitely before arriving in America - he'd been wiping himself down with wet-wipes and damps cloths for the past few weeks - but before then he was unsure. While making sure he ate and drank on schedule was relatively easy after breaking his conditioning, sleeping and washing had thus far escaped him. There had been little need for anything other than a perfunctory hose down by his handlers after being woken from cryo when he was still in the thrall of the soldier, and usually he'd do days without sleeping too. His handlers knew their time with him was limited and sleep would only cut into the mission allotted hours, so keeping him awake and functioning for as long as possible, only letting him collapse in exhaustion when he'd completed them mission, was normal. 

 _"You can sleep in the tube, soldier_ , _"_ they'd said. The words still rang in his mind every time he'd lie down to rest when his body began to physically turned on itself, thoroughly drained and desperate to recharge. Ignoring the phantom pain of electricity on his skin from stun guns they'd use to keep him awake, was the most difficult part in falling asleep once his head finally hit the pillow.  

But now, with Stark's reminder and the knowledge that  _Steve_ was only a few floors away, the temptation of a bath was headily settling beneath his skin. He ran the water until steam began to curl its way to the ceiling, and carefully slotted two of his throwing knives onto the rack next to the shampoo and conditioner already there. His gun meanwhile was balanced on a nearby shelf - in reach but in no danger of getting wet. When the water was only a couple of inches from the lip of the bath, he switched off the tap and began stripping himself of the heavy leather and kevlar, trying not to grimace as the thick smell of sweat and dirt permeated the air. He draped them over the sink before taking a deep breath and reaching up to pull off his mask and goggles. They hit the tiled floor with a thud and Bucky wasted no time in slipping into the warm water, groaning slightly at the sensation and allowing his eyes to flutter shut. 

He gave himself a few minutes to just  _enjoy_. To know that he could sit quietly, in the warmth, and not be punished. The water was kind to his skin and the grit that lingered there, running over his muscles soothingly, the light sweat from the heat not unpleasant. There were no overpowering scents, no harsh sounds, just the swill of the water around him and a feeling of _calm_ and  _weightlessness_. There were ghost sensations too though, too faint to catch until: 

_Fingers carding through his hair -_

_Laughter, light and careless and:_

_"Come on Buck, you stay in much longer you'll prune..."_

His eyes shot open as he lurched forward, hand reaching out for both the blades at his side and the person behind him, but his fingers grasped air.  _Another memory then,_ he thought, shaking himself and sitting. How many more would he get? Would they come thick and fast now he'd finally re-entered Steve's orbit? Or would they come sporadically and send him crashing into a relapse?

Despite Bucky's best intentions, the soldier was never deep enough under the surface to let him settle. Instead it lingered and hissed like a wild animal at triggers he didn't fully understand. The veteran snarled to himself, pulling forward Stark's shampoo and setting to work untangling the mess that was his hair, and scrubbing weeks of recon from his body. He couldn't help but let his fingers linger on the scars that littered his body. Some he knew were Hydra's work, others from when he'd been  _doing_ Hydra's work, but there were a rare few, old and faded to white, that he couldn't place, not least because they seemed to kind on his skin to belong to an organisation as cruel as Hydra. He guessed they must have been from  _before_ , when he was just **Bucky** and no one else. Something in him liked that: the physical reminders that he was more than the soldier Hydra had carved into his brain.

That he was a man. 

A human being. 

That he wasn't a weapon.

Somehow he knew he was playing pretend even with himself.

Eventually he clambered out, letting the brownish coloured water go and towelling off quickly. He couldn't wear his jacket and trousers, they were filthy and would need to be cleaned in order to be mission ready. Hopefully Stark would let him use the facilities to do so. He left them in the sink but paused to gather his mask and goggles from their place on the floor. He knew he'd need them when finally facing the Avengers. 

He found clothes in the wardrobe. The bottoms were a little short in the leg, but he rolled them up to sit under his knees, and the t-shirt and jumper fit just fine, although having the name 'STARK' plastered across his chest wasn't ideal, even if it set off something inside him he couldn't place. 

He was halfway through eating a tin of peaches, having already consumed two tins of beans, a pot of instant pasta, six bags of chips, half a loaf of bread and a bowl of cereal with powered milk, when the ceiling man interrupted him. 

" _Excuse me, sir,_ " Jarvis began.

Bucky swallowed. "Yeah," he croaked, still not completely comfortable with taking to an imaginary man. 

" _Mr Stark would like to inform you that he has spoken with the rest of the Avengers and they have agreed to assist you in the fight against Hydra."_

The man blinked before nodding to himself then: "Anything else?"

" _The team are eager to meet you_ ," Jarvis confessed before illuminating the sign above the main door that opened into the private elevator. " _If you would like to come down."_  

He didn't. 

He really didn't. 

He didn't for many reasons, and the first was the reason that he was  _there._ **Steve.** Because while he had spent weeks trekking across Europe, ignoring the connection he had to Captain America because he wasn't Bucky, even though he  _was_ , he had learned something.  

They had wanted Bucky to  _kill_ Steve.  

After all why else would they test his conditioning? Why else would they use Steve's voice to make sure he stayed the soldier unless they were planning to send him to kill him? They had known he was Bucky and had known that Steve might wake him up, so they tried to make sure he couldn't. Tried to make sure the orders would stick, even in the face of his _Stevie_.

Bucky didn't think he could become more angry at Hydra, despite the brainwashing and the torture, but at the idea of sending a man wearing Bucky's face to kill  _Steve_...? That made his rage glow white. Not least because he knew, even without his memories and little more than half formed snippets of his life, even with a brief life history he'd read off the internet, Bucky knew that he could fall back under conditioning, he could attack Steve, he could try and kill him, and Steve wouldn't hurt him. There was no chance that the blonde-haired idiot would protect himself from Bucky - not properly - if he knew it was him behind the mask. Instead the blonde haired man would plead with him, he'd sacrifice himself first, and he'd stop any of the Avengers that would try to take him out. 

Because Bucky was the only Commando Steve had lost. 

Because Bucky was his friend. 

Because Bucky was the reason his eyes were sad. 

Because Steve wouldn't look at him and see the Winter Soldier, a dangerous assassin - he'd see Bucky, his "friend since childhood". 

And that would blind him. 

 _And then we'd kill him_ , the soldier chimed in. 

Because they would. Because the soldier didn't know Steve,  _Bucky_ did. And if Bucky got lost inside the monster, then he could wake up and see the only person he  _knew_ lying dead at his feet - and that was a chance he  ** _couldn't_** take. 

It took a moment before Bucky realised that Jarvis was waiting for an answer. "Not today," he eventually croaked out. "But Stark, could I -?"

" _One moment,_ " the man relayed, clearly telling the Avengers of his decision.  _"Mr Stark is on his way up_ ," Jarvis announced. 

Bucky took a minute to steady himself, finally putting down the food and standing. He grabbed his mask and goggles, strapping them securely in place. 

The lights above the elevator flickered before finally settling and letting the doors open to reveal a rather hurried looking Stark.

"Tin Man," he greeted, before taking stock of the demolished food lying on the counter-top, "feeling camera shy?" he continued, grabbing a bag of dried blueberries. At the lack of response he frowned. "Team's on board," he said with a shrug. "Took some convincing, especially ol' spangly pants, but we're gonna help out with the little infestation. 'specially as it all checks out. Team's gonna start on the planning tomorrow."

"Good," Bucky nodded. 

Stark frowned again. "You don't wanna meet 'em?"

Bucky shook his head quickly before stopping. "Steve," he began, voice splintering. "Hydra wanted me to kill him."

Stark's eyebrows shot up. "Ya still feel like killing him?" he asked, completely unaware of the horror that filled Bucky at the mere  _thought_ of hurting Stevie -  _because he is Stevie isn't he, he's our Stevie, your Stevie, he's ours to protect because that punk he's gonna jump into fights and hell he's not gonna -_

Bucky grit his teeth to stop the thoughts. "No," he snarled, "you'll put me down if I do," he stated, tone flat and bleeding with Russian inflection. It was clear that such a response had not been expected but the understanding in Stark's eyes was suddenly blinding. 

"You go off the res, at any point, I've got you," he swore, but Bucky heard it loud and clear:  _I won't let you become Hydra's again_.

Bucky nodded. "Thank you," he grunted. "You should make a contingency, in case."

"J and I can handle you," Stark said, confidence bleeding through his tone. "But I gotta ask," he continued, leaning forward on his elbows and squinting at Bucky like he was an interesting new toy, "why us? I mean you've got all sort of fancy connections and you've been going at it alone alright, so why us?"

 _Because_ ** _he's here_** ,  _it's always been Steve -_

"I just woke up," Bucky offered instead. "I'd like to live before I have to die again."

Stark blinked. "That doesn't answer the question."

Bucky sighed long and hard. "There's nothing in my mind that feels  _right,_ except him. Just him. He's the only person I remember knowing and the only person I caring about. And Hydra knows it. Asking mercenaries or assets, I'd risk him getting hurt,"  _he'd go wading in because he always has to play the **goddamn hero** and he'd get hurt fighting bag guys and..._ "But this way I can protect him."

There was a pregnant pause. "Huh," Stark chuckled. "That's a hell of a love story there Winter."

"It's not - we weren't -"

"Frosty, look," Stark cut in, unimpressed, "you don't remember yourself or your own name, but you remember him? That's a love story. Hate to break it to you, but yeah, you got it bad."

Bucky shook his head again. "I have to protect him," he echoed, staring at Stark as well as he could behind the mask. "That's all I  _know_ , I have to."

"And do to that, Hydra has to go, and you have to get straight," Stark took a moment to snigger to himself, "and you need to get your memories back." He paused, tossing a blueberry up and catching it in his mouth. "Well lucky for you I got bored a few months ago and J and I cooked up B.A.R.F."

"What?"

"Binarily Augmented Retro-Framing," he continued, "go on, look impressed. It hijacks part of your brain, lets you see memories," he shrugged. "It's only in phase one right now, but lemme have a play and, who knows, it could help?"

"Thanks," he replied, voice starting to ache now with the amount of talking he'd been doing. 

"Anytime," he snorted, before jerking his head towards the bedrooms. "Sleep, we'll catch up tomorrow. Meanwhile I'll keep the children away and have some more food sent up, it's like feeding time at the zoo in here."

"Thanks," Bucky said again, watching the other man shuffled towards the elevator and finally disappear behind the closing doors. After a moment Bucky glanced up. "Jarvis?" he asked. 

" _Yes Winter?"_

"What can you tell me about Sergeant James Barnes?"

_"A considerable amount. My files on the Sergeant are quite extensive."_

"Did he know any Stark's?" Bucky asked, pulling his goggles and mask free. 

" _Yes. He and Howard Stark were friends for several years during the Second World War,"_ Jarvis replied. 

Bucky blinked. "Tell me about them."

 

 


End file.
